Interrogating Presidential Candidates

A dishonest man who deals in half-truths and whose true plans and motivations aren’t known is about to get his hands on nuclear weapons. I’m speaking, of course, of the scenario for every U.S. presidential election for the past several decades.

Why are we okay with politicians lying to us? Like with Obama’s claim that his “you didn’t build that” speech was actually pro-business and Romney’s switch from the left to the right on many issues, we know they’re not being honest with us, but all we do is shrug our shoulders. Lying is so expected that the politicians don’t even try to hide it very well, because they know our reaction to being lied to will be to simply roll our eyes and say, “Oh, you rascally, untrustworthy politicians; here’s the national checkbook and some nuclear launch codes.”

This is insanity. We need to take a much more adversarial approach with our politicians. During presidential elections, there’s always a poll about which candidate people would rather have a beer with, but I wouldn’t drink with either of them out of fear that as soon as I turned my head, they’d put something in my drink. You’ve seen what these people do to our money; they’re certainly not above giving us a roofie and doing weird stuff to us while we’re unconscious. These people constantly try to trick us and are not our friends, and we need to treat them appropriately. Friends don’t lie to you, boss you around, and then spend trillions of dollars they don’t have and expect your kids to pay for their spending. Most enemies won’t even do that.

So how should we treat politicians? Well, let’s think about this logically. If you had a terrorist in custody and knew he was lying to you, would you just throw up your hands and say, “That’s just how terrorists are, God bless ‘em!”? No, you would hand that terrorist over to the CIA, and, using techniques that a man who shot his friend in the face with a shotgun thought were legally justifiable, they would get the truth out of him. Well, presidential candidates will potentially have even more destructive power than any terrorist, and we also know they are lying to us. Thus we should be determined to get the truth from them by any means necessary.

The American psyche has a dark side to it, and that is their affection for the outlaw. There is a place of endearment for the con man, the grifter,the anti-hero, and the first place liar’s club award. Without the villain there is no hero, and the underdog who can beat the odds through whatever projection is cheered.
That being said, a popular venue for our anti-hero to be exposed is the ever prominent and witless reality tv show. Waterboarding on C-Span wouldn’t have the ratings compared to street hucksters competing for prizes by ripping off ordinary citizens. Which used car salesmen could most sincerely sell the nastiest lemon? The exposure of which politician could sell himself in picking the most pockets would make tagging the siver tongued devil easier to recognize.
Better yet, there was the old Greek method of having the politicians swear to drink hemlock after their term in office. That would do away with presidential libraries and vagrant insincerities.

Don’t know about doing this to candidates. On the other hand, in the interest of transparency, when an office holder is debfiefed (snicker) at the end of elected term, enhanced techniques should be fuly depoloyed to get to the bottom of some unanswered questions. (Please note this might take longer for some politicians than others.)

What a fantasy sequence: A windowless room lit by a single 40-watt bulb, with Obama immovably strapped to a steel chair and, as the interrogator’s argot goes, fully “wired for sound.” A sample of the introductory dialogue:

“Now, Mr. President, we’re going to ask you lots and lots of questions. We know the answers to some of them already, but you won’t know which ones. Any time we catch you in a falsehood, my assistant with the rubber gloves and boots and the evil grin will press a button on that field generator, and you’ll receive a reminder about how important it is for a politician to always tell the truth. How about a quick test of the equipment, Mr. Park, to make sure everything’s working and so the president will know what we’ve got in mind?”

Politicians have lied to us ever since there WERE politicians. I’m sure Cicero or Cato the Elder embellished the truth a little to defend their political arguments. Still, I wonder if ex-military men and women make the best politicians.

Throughout their careers they were taught a strict code of ethics of duty, honor, country. Pity more civilians don’t follow those same beliefs. We have had some outstanding ex-military presidents, such as Washington and Eisenhower. Then again, you had U.S. Grant, who presided over possibly the most corrupt administration there ever was. However, I don’t think Grant lied for personal gain. If he did, he would have been a lot wealthier than he was, especially in those days when politicians were incredibly corrupt. And then there was ex-Navy fighter ace Duke Cunningham, who went to jail for corruption.

Still, I think ex-military politicians at least have some ethical code of conduct and at least TRY to tell the truth. Whereas you have the Bill Clinton’s of the world who make lying an art form. On balance, I’ll stick with the military. Just another reason to vote for Allen West when he runs for president.

Eisenhower did not defend Hungary after he gave every indication that he would. At the end of WWII, Eisenhower carried out the Presidential order to return the refugees — the women and children — who were fleeing from the Baltic countries that had just been taken over by Communist Russia. General Mark Clark refused to obey that egregious order. Those actions alone disqualify him as a great President — or even a good man.

What irritates me is the fact that Congress just spent untold millions TRYING to convict Roger Clemmins of lying, and like most of ya’ll said…Congress, especially the current Administration, lies to us on a daily basis!!

Grant’s alledged corruption is overated. Certainly it has been superceeded by
Clinton and Obama.What is needed is a Corruption Index so we can make accurate
comparisons. Should we use percentage of Federal Budget,or dollar ammount in fixed dollars? HINT: The Talmud states; “The more fat, the moe worms,”

Lying? Haha. Let’s talk about drogs! Cocaine, meth, speed, painkillers. A few of them, who took drugs: Chamberlain, Hitler, Kennedy.
I wouldn’t let anybody to drive my car under drugs. Please. And they led the armys, the missles. I think, it’s a big problem too.

You know, way back when, employers were allowed to give employees lie-detector tests when a situation arised to call for one. Especially in embezzlement cases, a lie-detector test was given to the supsected person or parties involved which usually turned out the guilty party. But alas, the labor dept. stopped all that and the only way we can prosecute and embezzler is to catch them red handed, litterally. If we just let the general public ask the questions of our candidates on live television, I think they would eventually give up trying to be a candidate. Those stupid and ignorant folk sure have a way to put one over on you when you actually let one ask a question…

We make some “flip flops” necessary with the political system in which a politician has to please the Party’s base in order to get elected. It’s up to you to judge the seriousness of the issues. If Romney changed positions on abortion, he’s not going to change back when(hopefully) he becomes President. That’s what matters. As far as the present occupant of the White House is concerned, the information was out there as to what he really was if only people had chosen to look at it instead of listening to what they wanted to believe. Bill Ayers, Reverend Wright were enough to give a good indication of who he really was. If people choose to be ignorant, don’t blame the politicians. Furthermore, I do not for one minute believe Romney would put anything untoward in anyone’s drink — but I wouldn’t say the same for Obama. Just look at their histories.

The debates are going to be nothing but empty rhetoric and meaningless accusations thrown at each other. I propose that we move to a slap fight debate style. The candidates just stand there and trade slaps to each other in the face. The first one to cry loses.